


Pi(e) Day

by Zeplerfer



Series: 365 Days of USUK [1]
Category: Hetalia: Axis Powers
Genre: M/M, Pi, Pie, Teacher AU, math jokes, sugary sweetness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-14
Updated: 2015-03-14
Packaged: 2018-03-17 14:47:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,276
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3533354
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zeplerfer/pseuds/Zeplerfer
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>If Pie Day meant a date with the handsome gym teacher, then perhaps Arthur could learn to like mathematics after all.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Pi(e) Day

**Author's Note:**

> This was originally posted for the 2014 USUK calendar, but I've tweaked it to work for 2015. Happy Pie Day everyone! Today is a great one because it's currently 3/14/15 9:26:53am :D

The elementary students buzzed happily as Arthur led them down the school’s long hallways. They had four rotating electives and physical education was always their favourite. To be honest, it was Arthur’s favourite too... albeit for a much different reason.

The children loved P.E. because after a long day of reading and writing, it was a chance to run around and play games. They adored their fun-loving gym teacher, Alfred F. Jones, because he joined the games and acted like a 10-year old himself. He was fresh out of teacher’s college with all of the accompanying perks of youth: tan skin, toned muscles, and taut buttocks. He looked like he ought to be posing on magazines instead of playing hopscotch with his young charges. Alfred waved to Arthur as the children rushed into the gym; his smile was dazzling.

Blinking for a dazed moment, Arthur paused at the door. Although his eyes focused on the young teacher’s fit body, he also admired the man’s affinity for children. Unlike Arthur's somewhat irritable demeanor, Alfred grinned at the schoolchildren with easy affection. "Hey, kids! I’ve got a surprise for you today!" he called.

"What? Tell us, tell us!" The children bounced on their feet in excitement and demanded details.

Alfred shook his head and laughed. “Nope. You’re going to have to wait and see until after you’ve done your warm-up laps!”

The students eagerly began to race around the perimeter of the gym, apparently believing that the faster they ran, the sooner Alfred would reveal the surprise. Alfred joined them in the laps, showing off his nice legs. Arthur would have stayed to stare, but he knew from personal experience that it was dangerous to linger. Once Alfred rounded the corner, he’d see Arthur still standing at the door and invite him to join the games. The one time he had agreed, he'd ended up with a nasty bruise from the dodge-ball game. Reluctantly, Arthur turned around and walked back to his own classroom. At least the free period would give him an opportunity to grade spelling tests.

Sitting at his large desk, Arthur worked through the lists with his usual brisk efficiency, although his pen hesitated each time he had to mark ‘color’ as correct. Fortunately, none of the children had written ‘colour.’ Even though the extra u wasn't included on their practice lists, he wouldn't have the heart to mark it as wrong. Now and then he paused to look outside. The second-floor window near Arthur’s desk happened to give him a fresh spring breeze and a good view of the playground. His eyes naturally strayed from the tests when the children and their gym teacher rushed outside.

Although the kids normally jumped rope and played games, today the lesson seemed to be something different. Alfred used a string and piece of chalk to mark out a gigantic circle on the concrete. He handed out circular tins—pie tins?—to all of the children, who spent twenty minutes lining the outline of the circle. After they finished, it looked like the students were counting the number of tins.

Growing curious, Arthur leaned out his window so he could hear what the students and their teacher were saying. The sounds echoed across the concrete.

"How many for the radius?" the young teacher asked.

"Twenty-five!"

"And what was the circumference?"

"One fifty-seven!"

"Wow, perfect job! Do you know what we have to celebrate?"

The children shouted excitedly, their voices overlapping too much for Arthur to make out the answer. He watched as the children raced around the circle to collect the tins and then streamed back into the school building. Writing it off as a strange new game, Arthur returned to his spelling tests. When he finished some time later, he checked his email. The one from Alfred immediately caught his attention.

_Subject: Leftover PIE in the teachers longue_

_Message: Come and get it! XD_

Arthur winced at the spelling error, lack of apostrophe, and silly emoticon. How could one subject line have so many errors? No wonder he faced an uphill battle in teaching the children proper spelling. But he was curious enough to trot down to the teacher’s lounge. It was dingy little room with old carpet and even older appliances. But at the moment, it was filled with happy teachers, standing around and gossiping as they ate pie. Arthur slipped through the crowd. He found Alfred at the counter, standing near the few remaining slices.

"Hey, Artie!" Alfred grinned at him and gestured to the three remaining pies. "Rhubarb, apple, or shoofly?"

"Shoofly?"

"It’s a molasses pie. Real tasty." Alfred lifted a large slice onto a paper plate and handed it to Arthur with a wink. "If you’ve never had it before, you need to give it a try."

Alfred then served himself three slices of apple pie and sat with Arthur at one of the tables vacated by teachers who had already finished eating. Alfred devoured his slices, making Arthur wonder how he kept so trim.

Still, Arthur had to admit that his pie was tasty. It reminded him of treacle tart. "What’s the occasion?" he asked between bites, taking care not to speak while he was chewing.

“Pi day!" Alfred explained with a grin. "Technically it's tomorrow, but we had to celebrate before the weekend."

"...pie day?"

"Yep. I had the kids measure pi with pie and then we celebrated with pie! Well, technically, pi with pie _tins_ , because one hundred and eighty-two pies would be irrational. My mom’s bakery gave us the pies for eating.”

Arthur blinked in confusion. Pie? They hadn't been measuring pie outside, they had been measuring the circumference of a circle compared to its radius. Realisation finally dawned as his thoughts stirred a memory of geometry class long past and he remembered how they wrote dates in the States. Arthur groaned at the pun. “You know, _most_ of the world writes it fourteen slash three,” he noted tarty.

"Pfft. The American way is best."

"Yes, you would think that." Arthur rolled his eyes and shook his head fondly. At some point Alfred's ridiculous patriotism had shifted from silly to endearing. "But... it was rather sweet of you to bring the pie," he admitted with a slight smile.

"No prob!" Alfred smiled back. "If you don't like March, we can celebrate Pi Approximation Day. That’s July 22nd,” he clarified, looking strangely hopeful.

"We don’t have class in July," Arthur replied unthinkingly. He ate another bite of the sugary pie and paused when he noticed disappointment in Alfred's eyes. Well, if the young man really wanted more pie, Arthur decided it wouldn't be so bad to humor him. "But I wouldn't mind getting some pie with you," he offered.

Alfred's dazzling grin returned. "Great! It's a date!"

Arthur’s forkful of pie paused halfway to his mouth, leaving him gaping like a fish. Alfred was calling it a date. _Alfred_ was calling it a _date_. Apparently Arthur hadn’t been as circumspect in his ogling as he thought. There was only one problem. He wasn't going to wait four months for a date! Perhaps March was an acceptable date after all. “We could... we could celebrate it tomorrow,” he suggested, blushing to the roots of his hair.

"Really?" Alfred’s eyes sparkled. “How does dinner and a movie sound?”

"Splendid," Arthur replied happily. He finished the rest of his pie with a small blush on his face. He didn't even mind when Alfred picked the Life of Pi for their movie date night. Arthur had never particularly cared for mathematics in school, but he decided he could make an exception for pi.


End file.
